Since he's so good at talking, let's make him a deal. After he retires, he can tell somebody all the great things he did, and nobody disputes the legacy he is in his own mind, as long as he steps down in 2012 (after all, you don't speak ill of the departed).

In return, to earn being this legacy in his own mind, he gives up all the half-baked, warmed-over socialist crap he wanted to shove down our throats, and we call it even (we won't even say he was worse than Carter).

My momma said, "A presidency is like a box of choc-lits. You nevah know what your gonna get.

My grandma said something like that too, but I just threw her undah the bus."

Obama in Army Basic training:

Rahm Emmanuel: Obama! What's your sole purpose in this Presidency?

Obama Gump: To do whatever you tell me and never pass up on a crisis, Drill Sargeant Emmanuel!

Rahm Emmanuel: God damn it, Obama! You're a god damn genius! This is the most outstanding answer I have ever heard. You must have a goddamn I.Q. of 60. You are goddamn gifted, Obama Gump. Listen up, people...

Obama Gump: [narrates] Now for some reason I fit in the army like one of them round pegs. It's not really hard. You just make your bed real neat and remember to stand up straight and always answer every question with "I'm very sorry for what America has done to world."

[Obama Gump has finished assembling his Federal 2011 Budget]Obama Gump: DONE, DRILL SERGEANT EMMANUEL!Drill Sergeant Emmanuel: GUUUUUUMP! Why did you put that budget together so quickly, Gump?Obama Gump: [confused] You told me to, Drill Sergeant?Drill Sergeant: Jesus H. Christ![looks at stopwatch]Drill Sergeant Emmanuel: This is a new government record! If it wouldn't be such a waste of a damn-fine college professor and ACORN ex-counsel I'd recommend you for HPO (High Political Office)! You are gonna be a President someday, Gump, now disassemble your apologies and continue!

Lets see what kind of Republican candidate they field in 2012. Got to have a good one and I see nothing but a sea of nothing in front of me. Please, don't say Palin, Huckabee or Romney. Can't win. And don't say the savior is Scott Brown. Mark my word, he will do nothing in office. Attractive, semi-well spoken, nothing there.

My understanding is that the crazies in question define "natural-born citizen" as "two citizen parents plus born in US territory". Something about not being born with an allegiance to any foreign power (since hypothetically Obama could have claimed Kenyan or British citizenship, based on his father's citizenship).

I'm not totally sure where they're getting this strict definition, though. My understanding of "natural-born citizen" was always that it was the opposite of a naturalized citizen - that is, someone who was a citizen at birth - and Obama certainly falls in that category.

(Given that his mother was a citizen, he'd still be one if he was born on Mars, so I'm also not sure why the birth certificate thing matters.)

There used to be a difference between granting natural born citizenship status to a person born overseas to an American mother, non-citizen father, and one born overseas to an American father, non-citizen mother. That seems to have been changed by law near or around Obama's birth. And, it used to make a difference.

But, the whole "birther" argument also centers around whether Obama was born in the USA or in Kenya. The question of when Obama's mother returned to the USA would be the key to that; she was in Kenya before his birth; plus what was her age at his birth. Age of the American parent used to make a difference, coupled with country where the child was born.

Don't have the answer to these questions, but the questions that seem to be in disputed here are NOT those that bear of Obama's birth status.

Obama's father was a Kenyan and that doesn't really bears on Obama's birth status. And, I doubt if the parents' martial status per se factors in at all.

Actually, the parents' marital status does count, and for quite a lot.

Obama was, of course, born in Hawai'i. (I'm not a birther!)

But hypothetically, if a child in his place were not, there are these scenarios:

1. Parents were legally married. Since the mother was not 19 by the time of his birth, she could not fulfill the pre-1986 (post-1952) requirement that the citizen parent (married to an alien) have resided in the United States for ten years, five of which were after the age of 14.

In that case, the child (who isn't Obama) wouldn't be a citizen.

[This is how I became a US citizen, incidentally -- born abroad to a US citizen mom who married a foreigner.]

2. If the parents were not legally married, then the law about illegitimate children of US citizen mothers comes into play, which just has a requirement of one year's residence Stateside.

If, hypothetically, Obama were born in Kenya (which he wasn't), his parents' marital status would have mattered.

My read would be this: since Barack H. Obama Sr. married Ann Dunham bigamously (read "Dreams from my Father" closely), their marriage was legally invalid, therefore Barack H. Obama II would have been a United States citizen no matter where he was born. And b/c he was a citizen at birth, not naturalized, he therefore qualifies as a "natural-born" citizen.

Anyway. He was born in Hawai'i, and he's our president. End of very silly story. (And if he wasn't, then scenario two governs, and he's a natural-born citizen and our president.) And if you want to blame anyone for his left-winged-ness, the fault lies entirely within the borders of the US of A -- Obama is 100% American. American liberal, which is our home-grown problem. :p

As with most politicians, Obama's remark was mere posturing. He obviously didn't mean it as he's governing so gingerly, with so little daring or any attempt to actually accomplish anything. He obviously wants to win a second term, though I think he may not if he keeps on as he has. (Like Clinton before him, he's a Republican in Democrat's clothing.)

If he really didn't care, he would have taken on the entrenched special interests in Washington--the war profiteers and military lobby, the insurance and pharmaceutical interests, Wall Street, etc.--and attempted to destroy their deathgrip on America...and it is a deathgrip.

As it is, Obama's vainly trying to ameliorate our bad feelings as we're choked to death by these corporate assassins of our country.

That should be a frightening statement. It suggests he's willing to "get tough" in ways that sensible politicians are not, and so truly believes his (unpopular) views will end up being vindicated that he's willing to lose in order to cram them down our throat.

It's amazing to me that you and others like you haven't noticed by now that the Democrats are the establishment party, and have been at least since the Clinton presidency."

Who says I don't see the Dems as part of the establishment? They are simply the slightly less brutish, bellicose wing of the Republicrats Party. As Noam Chomsky and others before me have said, the Repubs and the Dems are simply one party, both serving the same masters. They pander to different segments of the American public, but they both serve the same interests on Wall Street and among the big-money lobbies (military, pharmaceuticals, oil, etc.)...that is to say, those who really run this country.

I won't say there's no difference between them, but practically speaking there isn't.

Very interesting. I cannot help but wonder if Obama's caginess regarding his birth cert has something to do with his mother's age and/or his father's bigamous status. It's not like any of that rather sketchy conduct is his fault, but he and the media are rather good at glossing over it. I am personally more interested in his red-diaper upbringing.